


and live like we’re still alive

by windandthestars



Category: The Newsroom (US TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, F/M, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Post-Series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-28
Updated: 2019-02-28
Packaged: 2019-11-07 00:56:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,481
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17950520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windandthestars/pseuds/windandthestars
Summary: “I brought flowers.” He says after what seems like a reasonable amount of time, a comfortable amount of silence and she smiles faintly. It wasn’t like him to make grand gesture like this, but he’d do it for her.





	and live like we’re still alive

**Author's Note:**

> Post-series. If certain conversations hadn’t happened on election night where would we be a year later? Spoilers for the ends of both seasons 2 and 3. Mention of major character death. Title from the Sara Bareilles song ‘Chasing the Sun’.

_“I am. I've decided to live my life as if I'm alive.” — Will McAvoy, 1.04 Fix You_

He’d known earlier when Millie had stopped him to say Mac had “gone out” that she’d gone to a cemetery. There wasn’t anywhere else she would go, but he’d let Jim mention it again, a discreet “she wanted a minute” when he’d gone back down to grab his coat before heading out.

It’s been a hell of a week, so while there’s a couple of options, Manhattan wasn’t totally devoid of cemeteries, he knows she won’t have gone farther than she needed to.

“This has to be the smallest cemetery in the city.” He says standing just inside the gate watching her stare vacantly at the ground in front of the ledger stone she’s sitting on. He’s surprised she’d made it that far, that she hadn’t stayed where he’s standing on what remains of the brick walkway.

It’s been wet the last couple of days, the ground squelching underfoot as he makes his way over to where she’s sitting. It’s only a dozen steps but he figures they would’ve been hell in heels which would explain why she’s sitting with her shoes propped up next to her.

“Maybe.” She says responding to him and he smiles encouragingly hoping she might keep talking.

“They haven’t buried anyone here since 1829.”

He’d read the plaque outside. Outside where the whole place looked like somebody’s yard, just another brick wall up against the sidewalk with a gate tucked next to a midrise building. Even peeking through the gate at the line of headstones against the back wall hadn’t done much to dispel the notion but that doesn’t seem to be bothering her.

“It’s closer than Trinity.”

And quieter too he figures but he doesn’t mention that as he nods agreeing.

“Mind if I join you?” He gestures toward the stone beside her and she turns to move her shoes as he reaches to scoop them up, one finger in the back of each heel, so he can sit resting them against the knee of his jeans. 

“I brought flowers.” He says after what seems like a reasonable amount of time, a comfortable amount of silence and she smiles faintly. It wasn’t like him to make grand gesture like this, but he’d do it for her. 

He hasn’t made a habit of the flowers, but he has made a point of showing up when he knew she was out. She seems to appreciate it even though they never said much, even though he doesn’t understand what draws her to these quiet spaces. He wants to ask, but he knows better than to make a mess of that conversation so he keeps showing up, wondering if maybe some time she’ll try to explain.

He has some idea, a nebulous notion of what compels her. Jim, when he’d asked, had been quick to point out that it’d always been a thing with Mac. But it hadn’t been and Will had wondered when that had changed, and less importantly, why. She’d been through a lot they hadn’t talked about, he understood that, but it still felt strange not knowing, stranger still that Jim didn’t know, although Don, Don seemed to have some idea.

“It came up.” Don had offered and Will had almost sighed in exasperation because nothing ever just came up with Mac, not something like this, not when she’d made a point of not saying anything to anyone else. “She asked me what I thought happened when we died. I told her whatever it was it’d better be nice because I couldn’t take an eternity of other people’s shit.”

“That just came up?”

“We talk about stuff, spiritual stuff, sometimes. It helps things make sense. Maybe.” He’d tacked on in a way that suggested it was Mac that seemed to feel that way and Don had never bothered to disagree so Will had let it go thankful that he knew to stick to small gestures and keep his mouth shut so he didn’t say something stupid like ‘Charlie isn’t here’, because he wasn’t, but she didn’t need to hear that now, especially not from him.

“I brought stones.” She replies and smiles again at his surprise, holds on to the feeling for a second before she explains. “It’s a Jewish cemetery.”

“Yeah.”

“Sometimes people bring stones.”

“Should I ditch the,” he draws the words out waiting for a reply and she shakes her head, pointing to the row of headstones.

“You can leave them there. Oh,” she stops herself when he pulls the tiny arrangement from inside his jacket where he’d left it nestled in the inside pocket. “They’re beautiful.”

He shrugs and she reaches for them, peers at them for a while tracing her fingers over the petals. 

He’d asked for something simple, just a couple of flowers. He hadn’t wanted anything that would be a hassle if he missed her, but she doesn’t seem to mind the fact that the bouquet’s missing its usual grandeur, if anything she seems charmed by it.

“There’s a little girl.” She points and he takes them from her, getting up to lay them on the stone she’d indicated.

He never knows what it is that draws her to particular graves. He always stops himself from doing the math, from looking too closely at the inscriptions, but he wouldn’t be surprised if she read every one, silently cataloging them, tying them to something, someone else.

“I don’t want to go back to the office.” She confess when he retakes his seat beside her.

“We could grab dinner after the show if you want something to look forward to.” He offers as she draws her knees up to rest her chin in the cradle she’s created.

“I’m not very good company.”

“That’s all right.” He assures her and she turns her head to look at him. She’d said that the last time he’d offered, and while she’d been quieter than normal during most of dinner the look of relief on Jim’s face the next morning had been enough to confirm that the gesture had been appreciated. “You’re starting to look pale.”

“But not slimy.” She infers and he’s startled to realize that it’s been almost a year since the evening of that particular conversation in his office.

“You look more stressed.” He decides to tell her honestly, more careful than he had been that night. “Though you do look tired.”

“I am tired. Of Pruitt.” She musters a smile at the half joke. “He hates me.”

“I don’t think he hates you.” He says firmly and she considers that for a second. That’s another shift their relationship has taken recently. Dinner and then this, the way she seems to consider him some sort of expert on the people who might hate her, the comfort she finds in his denials.

“He finds me infuriating.” She finally concludes and he can’t help but smile.

“Those aren’t the same thing.”

“Sometimes they are.” She’s back to frowning faintly as she sighs. “Jim’s going to be looking for you.”

“He knows where I am.”

“He’s going to be waiting.”

He can’t deny that, she knows that. It’s getting late, getting dark, pushing six o’clock. They’d be putting the finishing touches on the show for tonight any minute now. “All right, I’ll meet you in the lobby after or should I come up?”

“Downstairs.” She doesn’t pause to consider as he hands her back her shoes. “I’ll try not to be late.”

*

She isn’t late; she’s waiting for him perched on one of the bollards outside, feet at awkward angles on the sidewalk looking every bit as worn down as she had her first night back in his newsroom four years ago.

“Hey.” He smiles when she looks up and he holds out an arm so he can steer her toward his car without saying much.

She’s tired and clearly distracted, settling in to stare out the window then turning toward him surprised when they pull up to the curb outside his place. “We’re at your place.”

“I thought this might be better.” He sits waiting while she considers. She doesn’t seem to be weighing her option, dinner’s on him but he’s always let her pick the place, although there had been times like tonight when she hadn’t offered a suggestion and he’d done his best to guess what she might be interested in. He could offer but it was up to her to decide, which she does with a shrug before scooting over to follow him inside.

“Thai.” She musters a smile for Manny’s hello and for the bag he pulls from behind the security desk to hand to Will.

He’d called and asked for a favor, not wanting to miss the delivery but not wanting to be left waiting either. It’d been a bit of a gamble ordering takeout, but it seems to be paying off as Mac wanders into the dining room, the faintest hint of a smile still lingering.

“You want something to drink?”

She’s over at the table digging through takeout cartons so it takes her a minute to turn back toward him and consider the question. “We need something fruity. Do you have lemons?”

He has a couple of bottles of wine, he almost always does, but he knows she won’t be interested, not tonight, even without the Thai food, so he doesn’t offer. “If you’re looking for a whiskey sour the best I have is orange juice.”

“Whiskey and orange works. Make it a double.” She adds as she finishes arranging the cartons in a ring in one corner of the table.

“That kind of week?”

“Day.” She sighs.

“Pruitt on you again?” He asks careful to keep his tone conversational. She won’t talk about his show, what Pruitt thinks of it, what he’s saying, threatening. She doesn’t want him getting cold feet, doesn’t want him pushing Jim to change the show, even if now his feet were more lead than ice, even if he wouldn’t if she asked him not to.

“Yeah.”

“He still mad about Elliot’s show?” This is as close as he can get to asking about his own show and still expect an answer, but he’s curious, hoping to glean something from her response but she only sighs and nods, glancing over to watch him top off her drink.

“He’s always mad about Elliot’s show.”

Will pulls a face to let her know what he thinks about that, but it doesn’t get a smile. He hadn’t been expecting one.

“Here’s to two days of peace.” Will hands her her drink and tips his in her direction.

“Yeah.”

“No?” He wagers a guess and she turns away to fuss with the food again. “I’ll shut up.” He offers and he’s surprised to hear her laugh, a tiny chuckle as she sets her glass on the table and turns toward him.

“Charlie would love this. Us.” She sobers up, hesitates. “Is this as good as it gets, us being friends?”

It’s clearly a painful thought he can see that, but he doesn’t want to lie to her so he sighs in frustration. “I don’t know, Mac. I hope—”

He stops, letting his gaze soften as she looks away, trying to collect herself, stop her eyes from watering.

“I miss him too.”

“I don’t just miss him because life was easier before.” She says softly and he wants to punch whoever put that idea in her head. Charlie had meant a lot to him but that didn’t mean he didn’t mean anything to Mac. She’d had a hard time. Red-eyed at the funeral she’d disappeared for a while halfway through the wake. He’d never asked her about that, about how she was doing, not with the whirlwind of her promotion, and his continued hesitance at the time to let her any closer.

He’s softened since then in a way he knows she’s noticed, but she still doesn’t move until he shifts toward her, laying a hand on her arm.

“That’s bullshit.” He mutters and she nods leaning toward him as he wraps his arms around her.

She had a way of clinging to him now when they hugged, laying claim to and refusing to let go of whatever comfort the gesture gave her and so he holds her carefully, patiently, one hand cupped around the back of her head, the other in the small of her back.

Once, when they’d done this, when he’d pulled her close enough to hold her, she’d whispered to him, “don’t let go,” so pleadingly, so quietly that he hadn’t yet forgotten the way he’d felt the ache along with her and so he holds her and lets her have her moment uncluttered with words, lets her be, lets her pull away and fuss with the food until she picks up her glass and settles into a seat.

There’s a relief now that comes with seeing her like this. It’s a new feeling, an unsettling one. One he knows has little basis in any sort of reality, but he supposes it’s easier to worry about this, about something tangible rather than everything else. She’d never eaten during rundown meetings but he’d grown used to seeing her circle back around to pick over the leftovers, grown used to ordering her lunch along with his, or hearing Jim do the same and he wondered how often that happened now, how often the office sandwich runs still included the turkey on rye she was so fond of, how often she spent her lunch breaks, when she took one, alone.

He worried about the lack of a reminder, the lack of connection to the rest of them, the food and the solitude. He’s been worrying more lately, worrying about more things lately. It’d been an odd feeling at first, as out of practice as he’d been, but he’s more comfortable now with letting things lie, quietly, unspoken when she needed him to.

“Jim said something, baseball,” she tries guessing, obviously sorting through some conversation she half remembers if at all.

“The World Series?” He supplies with raised eyebrows, unable to stop himself from teasing even though he knows she’s only asking for a distraction.

“That happened.” She’s sure about that. “Don mentioned—”

He laughs and she stops, eyes rising from her plate to watch him.

“The six biggest games of the year and Don’s the one who—” He stops with a shake of his head.

“I thought there were seven.”

“Sometimes.” He agrees before starting back at the beginning, the first game, knowing she’s unlikely to listen to anything he says, but he tries to fit in the bits he knows Jim might have found amusing, hoping the familiarity might draw her out of whatever she was trying not to wallow in.

He makes it through the fifth game before they move to the couch with dessert. It’s an old, almost forgotten habit. Mac had never been particularly invested in sitting at a table to eat. She’d often grow restless by the time they’d both shut up long enough to eat their fill so he’d grown used to moving to the kitchen or the living room when she’d finished the main course so she could get back to work, or poke around, or poke at him depending on how the mood struck her.

Tonight she’s pensive, thankful for the distraction the shuffling provides as she sets her empty rocks glass in the sink and joins him with a relieved sigh.

“There’s two of these.” He holds up the containers of sweet sticky rice. He’d ordered two different kinds, the usual mango one and one of the monthly special. She smiles at that, picking the one closest to her and prying the lid off with a bemused expression.

“My mom’s started asking me when I’m taking a vacation.” She fits the spoon in her mouth and fixes him with a look.

“Don’t you dare give her my number.” He warns her shaking his spoon at her for emphasis. Mrs. McHale was proud of her daughter, pleased he knew with the sudden promotion, though if she was asking about Mac taking time off, taking time off now, it meant she was worried, worried the same way he was, but that didn’t mean he wanted to have that conversation. He didn’t envy the person who was going to have to explain the difference between Mac having vacation time and her actually using it. She wasn’t leaving ACN with Pruitt as involved as he was, she wouldn’t risk that. He knew he didn’t know the half of it, but even so he couldn’t blame her, making Mrs. McHale understand that was an entirely different story.

“I wouldn’t.” She frowns at him a little peeved he thinks, but possibly a bit amused.

“She has Jim’s number.”

“That was an emergency. I wasn’t exactly conscious at the time to tell him not to call her.”

Pakistan he figures but he doesn’t ask. “You know I’d probably end up agreeing with her.”

She isn’t sure that’s true, he can see that, but she doesn’t look as annoyed at the possibility as he thought she might.

“I can’t right now.” She watches him shovel a spoonful of rice into his mouth.

“I know. That doesn’t mean I don’t wish—”

“Can I have some of that?” She’s frowning at his dessert so he holds it out to her with a shrug expecting her to scoop up a bit with the spoon she’s holding but she slips it into her own dessert and picks up his, carefully transferring a healthy serving into her mouth before returning the spoon.

He’s tempted to ask her why she occasionally insisted on doing things like that, but she’s smiling softly at what he assumes is an irritated look on his face. “Was that because I agreed with your mother?”

She laughs at that with a quick shake of her head and smiles at him. “You’re always so good to me.”

He snorts at that, retorts. “Except for when I’m being a total ass.”

“I never mean that.”

“There are plenty of times when you should have.” He says with a careful firmness and her smile fades.

“Billy.” The nickname slips out and he reaches over to squeeze her knee.

“I fucked up a lot of things.”

He’s not expecting her to agree but he’s surprised by how strongly she disagrees, how quickly she dismisses the idea. “You were worried—”

“I’m not talking about the show.” He doesn’t add anything else. 

He lets her sit with that for a moment, knowing it’s a lot more than he’s said in a long time and not nearly enough of what he should say. He knows it wouldn’t fix everything, but it might fix them, fix them just enough so that he doesn’t end up being the one who breaks her, the thing that breaks her because he’s terrified of that happening.

“I—” He starts to say as the silence stretches between them but she cuts him off, decisive and decided. She hadn’t heard him hesitating, she’d been too busy hesitating herself.

“How do I know I’m not messing this up?” The question comes suddenly with a deep furrow between her eyes. “ACN. News Night.”

“You mean because Pruitt’s not a great barometer?”

“He’s not a great,” anything she means to finish with, but she’s too busy staring at him pleadingly to realize she’d stopped speaking.

She wants him to fix this although he knows she has to know he can’t. “You don’t mess everything—”

“Especially when you’re around.” She cuts him off, her disagreement sharp with distress. “I fuck everything up. You know I do.”

“Mac.”

“I should have seen it.”

He sighs as patiently as he can, knowing if they’re working their way backward that they’re going to be at this for a while.

“We made a mistake. One. We all did.” He insists when she tries to argue. “It was a human mistake. You can’t blame us for that.”

“I guess I make a lot of those then.” She sighs obviously frustrated and more morose than she had been all day, although he notices she’s unbothered by the shift in her mood. She’d been feeling it all day, nothing had changed, he hadn’t changed that, but she’d given up the pretense of having to hold everything together. She wasn’t exactly sharing the load, but this was more than she normally said about how hard things were, about how much she was struggling; he’d given her that.

“I can’t hold that against you. I fucked everything up when I tried that.” He offers candidly, carefully scraping the bottom of his cup with his spoon. “You don’t look convinced.”

“You’re trying to make me feel better.”

“So I’m lying?”

“No.” It’s clear she believes that. “I don’t understand why.”

“Why I’m trying to make you feel better?”

“Why you think you fucked everything up.” She corrects frowning at him.

“You did everything right. You made one mistake, but everything else— the rest was me, Mac.” He insists. “Before when you asked me, if I thought this was the best we could hope for, no, the answer is no.”

She stares at him and he sets his cup aside, considering for a second the possibility of just shutting up, but he’s never been able to stop caring, he knew he never would, there wasn’t any point in denying that. “I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to— I,” he stops to shake his head at himself, at his fumbling. He’s thought about this conversation a hundred times, a thousand times, but he’d never known what to say, what he should say. “I should have said something a year ago, two years ago.”

“Why the fuck didn’t you?”

“Fear, pride maybe,” he suggests more hesitantly. “You’ve been asking me to say something and I should have.”

“Say what?” she asks and he reaches over to tug lightly at the hand she has lying on her knee, wanting to know she’s looking at him, that she’s seeing him, because she deserved at least that much, to know he was serious, to know that he meant it.

“That I never stopped. I never stopped loving you.”

She stares at him, swallows, drops the spoon she’d still been holding into the cup perched next to his hand, her fingers shifting so he can wind hers between his own.

“You’re serious?” It’s a genuine question, but she isn’t doubting him, she isn’t confused, a little startled maybe, but not confused.

“More serious than I have ever been.”

“Well that’s a relief.” She says dryly and he has to stop himself from laughing, from reminding her that he’s hopelessly serious around almost everyone but her, because while she might be teasing him, now isn’t the time for him to do the same.

“I tried to tell you after the bin Laden broadcast.”

“You fucking—” she presses her eyes shut and heaves a sigh. Exasperated it all says but there’s something lighter about her, about the way she’s sitting, about the smile that’s lingering at the corners of her mouth. 

“Idiot.” She says opening her eyes to fix him with a look, eyes shining. “You—” she sighs again and he smiles, he can’t help it.

“I’m trying.”

“I know.” Her smile at that is a little tired but she looks happy, happier than he’s seen her in months, but still so tired, worn out in a way he hasn’t been able to stop worrying about.

“I’m so tired.” She says softly, leaning toward him and he leans away a bit, reaching to set her empty cup next to his own on the table behind him before leaning forward, drawing her closer so that her forehead’s resting on his shoulder, her fingers still wrapped in his.

“I’m sorry.” He says softly, gently, the words as empathetic as they are an admission of guilt. “When was the last time you had a decent night’s sleep?”

“2006.” She says with a hitch in her voice and he sighs into her hair.

I’m sorry he wants to say again because he knows that’s partly his fault, but she deserves so much more than that, than him telling her he knew he’d messed up. He couldn’t fix that, he wasn’t sure he could fix this either, not tonight, maybe not ever, but he was trying and she knew that now. That counted for something.

“Anything I can do to help?”

“Keep breathing. It sounds nice.”

He can feel her smiling so he keeps the edge out of his rebuttal. “It sounds nice?”

“Mhmm.” She sighs, growing somber he realizes when she continues. “It sounds like you’re alive, like I haven’t killed you too.”

“Mac, that’s not—”

“I know.” She says, but it’s a little too quick, like she’d been waiting to say that, wanting to, but not wanting to explain, not wanting to think too much about it.

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know.” She sounds a little irritated now, a little edgy so he doesn’t press it, doesn’t insist on it while he waits to see what else she wants to say.

“It’s— everything’s been falling apart and I just, I can’t. Not now.”

“It’s not, but it can be.”

He’s not sure what it is that brings that particular thing to mind, why now in this moment, but it seems apt, something better than the boat metaphor he’d tried to offer her when she’d wavered for a moment in her acceptance of her promotion, because no one had asked her, he’d realized that then, but she had asked him, in her own way, if he still had faith in her and he’d tried to tell her yes. 

He’d been so sure that he had faith in her, he’d wanted her to know that, but he’d been so shaken up, reeling, trying desperately to deal with the bone deep loss, with a stark recognition of mortality, not his own but of hers; she’d looked so fragile in that moment, reaching out to him when he’d so studiously been denying her the opportunity for days, so he’d given her that, that ridiculous metaphor and hadn’t offered her anything else, hadn’t given her the hope she’d been looking for, but he wanted her to have it now, he needed her to have it. It’d taken him a ridiculously long time to realize that. It was her faith that had kept him on his feet, kept them all on their feet and she’d known that so she hadn’t asked, hadn’t questioned, so he’s offering it to her now, he supposes the only way he knows how, the same way she’d given it back to him all those years ago. “Right now it’s not OK, but it can be.”


End file.
